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At 10.30 on the morning of the 18th the Brigade moved northwards along a road strewed with the jetsam of a retreating army, until Ramleh was reached. Here a bivouac area was taken up in an olive grove but after three hours' halt, orders were received for an advance on Ludd, the ancient Lydda. We arrived at 19.00 and bivouacked beside the road about half a mile south-west of the town.
Till we crossed it the river was the boundary between the British and Turkish armies in this sector, and all the advantage of observation was on the northern bank. From it the town of Jaffa and its port were in danger, and the main road between Jaffa and Ramleh was observed and under fire.
Dinwiddie pointed us to Ashdod, and to Ekron, a little to the left of Ramleh. "And that is where Nebuchadnezzar was with his army, before he went up to Jerusalem," I said. "The first time," said Mr. Dinwiddie.
He then consented to cede Damascus, in consideration of an annual tribute of 140,000 pieces of gold, and the restoration of all that portion of Palestine between Ramleh and the frontiers of Egypt. After having concluded all the arrangements relative to this treaty, Muhammed el-Ikshid returned to Egypt in the year 329 of the Hegira.
Fortunately large dumps of foodstuffs had been formed at Deir Sineid and Ramleh, and by means of camel transport, for every other means of transport broke down at one time or other, we were able to be fed. Christmas Day was miserably wet, and owing to the conditions we were lucky to get a full ration of bully and biscuits for our Christmas dinner.
Early in the eleventh century there was a fully organized Jewish community with a Beth-Din at Ramleh, some four hours' drive from Jaffa. But Jews did not visit Palestine in large numbers, until Saladin finally regained the Holy City for Mohammedan rule, towards the end of the twelfth century.
Thence it is three parasangs to Rams, or Ramleh, where there are remains of the walls from the days of our ancestors, for thus it was found written upon the stones. About 300 Jews dwell there. It was formerly a very great city; at a distance of two miles there is a large Jewish cemetery .
We rode for miles through a sea of wheat, waving far and wide over the swells of land. The tobacco in the fields about Ramleh was the most luxuriant I ever saw, and the olive and fig attain a size and lusty strength wholly unknown in Italy. Judea cursed of God! what a misconception, not only of God's mercy and beneficence, but of the actual fact!
Everywhere articles of value were piled up, and it was evident that the gang must for the last fortnight have been engaged in looting all the villas and houses along the road to Ramleh. "I expect we have got the whole gang, but I will leave four men here in charge with orders to make prisoners of anyone that enters. We will lodge these scoundrels in jail, and then make our report.
D.G. Dalman, Z.D.P.V., 1904, vol. Ramleh did not exist in Bible times it was founded in 716. It prospered to such an extent that it became as large as Jerusalem. It was a good deal damaged by an earthquake in 1033. Ramleh had a large Moslem population, and the Jews there remained comparatively unmolested by the Crusaders.
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